Spring Chickpea Sensory Bin Play
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If you’re looking for a fun and easy way to spark your child’s imagination while honing those fine motor skills, you will love this spring-themed chickpea sensory bin with spring and rainbow-colored bin fillers! Invite those little hands and tiny fingers to explore, scoop, and pour, boosting their sensory development. My boys always have the most fun playing with a variety of sensory bins, it really is a great way to expose young children to imaginative play, fine motor development, and more (especially during a rainy day)!
It turns out that chickpeas (also sometimes called ‘garbanzo beans’) are very easy to dye! All you need is a resealable bag, some food dye or paint, and little to no downtime for drying. Before you know it, you’ll be filling a sensory tray with vibrant colors of chickpeas and your child will have so much fun.
Think about it, you can set up color sorting, counting, search and find, letter identification, and more types of activities to boost your child’s knowledge. You can even include some great tools like scoopers, jumbo tweezers, a sifter, or even small containers to make the sensory experience even more exciting.
What You’ll Need to Make This Chickpea Sensory Bin
- 2 – 16 oz dried chickpea beans
- 4 Acrylic paint colors (pink, green, yellow, and teal)
- 4 sandwich ziplock bags
- Wax paper
- Cooking sheet
- 1 C measuring cup
As you can see, you won’t need a lot of materials to make this fun and colorful sensory bin. If you’re using paint, you’ll want to set aside about 3 to 4 hours of preparation time to allow the paint to completely dry before letting your child play with them. If you use food coloring, it shouldn’t take more than an hour for the chickpeas to dry.
How to Dye Chickpeas for Sensory Bin Activities
Dyeing your chickpeas is overall a very easy process. Follow the steps below. Remember, using dried chickpeas is best for dying them and getting those bright vibrant colors.
- Divide your dried chickpeas evenly into each zip lock bag (approx 1 & 1⁄4 C per bag).
- Then, focusing on one bag at a time, add a squirt of paint. Seal the bag, roll, and shake the dried beans toget them coated with paint.
- Repeat step 2 (the previous one) until all 4 baggies of dried chickpeas are completely painted.
- Then, line a large cooking sheet with wax paper. Carefully pour each bag of painted chickpeas out into a single layer.
- Allow your painted dried chickpeas to air dry for about 3-4 hours. If you’re in a time crunch, you can place the baking sheet in the oven on very low heat to speed up the process.
Once your chickpeas are all dried, you’re ready to use them as a fun sensory bin filler!
How to Use Your Chickpea Sensory Bin
As mentioned earlier in this article, there are SO many sensory play ideas you can create with these spring color chickpeas (or any chickpeas to be honest). Check out the list below on how to use your chickpeas in a way your child will enjoy! Rotate through some of the ideas below each week to keep it exciting and fun!
- Chickpea Treasure Hunt:
- Activity: Bury small toys or objects within the chickpeas for an exciting treasure hunt!
- Supplies Needed: Dried chickpeas, small toys or objects, sensory bin, scoops, cups, and tweezers or tongs for picking up treasures and a little treasure box to place the items in (optional).
- Chickpea Sorting and Counting:
- Activity: Sort chickpeas by color or size and practice counting. Use colored cups or number cards to make it fun! Here’s a great example of a counting sensory bin.
- Supplies Needed: Dried rainbow chickpeas (dyed in different colors for color sorting), sensory bin, scoops, cups, sorting trays, colored cups or muffin tins, and number cards for counting.
- Chickpea Art Exploration:
- Activity: Use sensory chickpeas as bin fillers for creating art by pressing them into clay or playdough. You can have your child match a pattern or let them explore independently.
- Supplies Needed: Dried chickpeas, modeling clay or playdough, sensory bin, rolling pin, cookie cutters, google eyes, and paint or markers for decorating (for example, build an apple pie with your clay and use the chickpeas as the apples).
- Chickpea Imaginative Play:
- Activity: Pretend play with chickpeas using a variety of different themes to set up your bin. For example, a farm-themed bin, an underwater ocean bin, etc…
- Supplies Needed: Dried chickpeas, pretend play toys, sensory bin or large container, utensils (spoons, spatulas, etc.), and any other items needed to build out your themed sensory bin.
As you and your child begin the chickpea sensory bin adventure, you have endless possibilities for playful learning and exploration with your little one. Whether you decide on a colorful treasure hunt sensory bin, engage in sorting and counting activities, unleash creativity through art exploration, or dive into imaginative play, it’ll be filled with laughter and discovery. With just a few simple materials and some out-of-the-box thinking, you’ve crafted a spring-themed sensory experience that’ll enhance your child’s development in such a fun way. So, gather your chickpea-filled bins and let the fun continue, one scoop at a time!
